TVB series Inbound Troubles becomes famous overseas! The New York Times published an article "Hong Kong TV Drama Plays Out Uneasy Ties with China" on February 10th, introducing the series and its topics. Once the news came out, Louis Cheung and Bob Lam quickly reposted on Weibo. As one of the leads, Wong Cho Lam expressed: "Wah! 'Inbounds' on the New York Times? So actually, this series didn't just gain attention in HK and Mainland, but also got international recognition! All the hard work and efforts by the crew and the cast really was worth it!" Also, TVB expressed Inbounds is the current titleholder of the top rated series of 2013, the series averaged 30 points and peaked 34 points.

HONG KONG — The tensions between residents here and mainland Chinese visitors dominate the headlines of the city’s papers, with mainlanders blamed for a shortage of school slots, bad manners in stores and a hypercharged property market.

So it should come as little surprise that a television show would come along to tap into these anxieties and, perhaps in a gift to the show’s producers, also draw the attention of mainland censors.

“Inbound Troubles” tells the story of two cousins — one from Hong Kong and the other from the mainland — and the tensions in a city whose wealth increasingly rests on a flood of mainland visitors who nevertheless draw scorn for lavish spending and, some say, boorish ways.

In the show, the cousin from mainland China is shown littering, running red lights and parking illegally, while the one from Hong Kong makes his living with a travel agency that specializes in encouraging new arrivals from the mainland to part with more of their cash.

The TVB network program, which has just ended its monthlong run, was shown as the city’s leadership struggled to confront the latest supposed peril attributed to mainlanders: a shortage of baby formula said to have been caused by the hoarding of supplies by mainland Chinese who have crossed the border into Hong Kong (apparently out of fear of tainted supplies in China).

Some Hong Kong residents have become so agitated about the formula milk problem that they have asked the United States to intervene, using a petition on the White House Web site titled, “Baby Hunger Outbreak in Hong Kong, International Aid Requested.”

The petition, created in late January, has already drawn 23,000 signatures.

The show’s candid depictions of mainland-Hong Kong relations — one scene focuses on the formula shortage — have drawn hundreds of complaints to Hong Kong regulators from viewers upset at things like its portrayals of mainlanders and its depiction of the Hong Kong’s tourism industry as predatory. And Chinese officials censored trailers for the program on the mainland, where it could be viewed on TVB’s overseas channel or through video streaming.

China also did some trimming of the version shown on the mainland, once the program began there. It deleted a depiction of a protest outside a Hong Kong clothing store, a scene apparently based on a demonstration against a Dolce & Gabbana store that let free-spending mainlanders photograph merchandise while barring Hong Kong residents from doing the same.

Still, the show clearly struck a nerve, becoming the TVB channel’s highest-rated drama this year.

To some, the tensions captured in the show are a natural outgrowth of fears about Beijing’s increasing influence in Hong Kong, a former British colony that retained considerable legal autonomy and civil rights after it was handed back to China in 1997.

“Politically, more and more Hong Kongers resent the fact that Beijing is tightening its control over Hong Kong’s political development,” Willy Lam, a scholar on Chinese history and politics at the Chinese University of Hong Kong, wrote in an e-mail.

He added that the current leader of Hong Kong, Leung Chun-ying, “is seen as a yes-man chief executive bowing to every instruction from the mainland authorities.”

“There is a common feeling that fat-cat mainlanders are driving up real estate prices,” he said. “You have witnessed of course the drama over formula milk powder.”

Although polls show that an increasing number of Hong Kong residents hold pessimistic views about the city’s future and Hong Kong-mainland relations, in “Inbound Troubles” the two cousins gradually acclimate to each other, with the one from the mainland adapting to local ways.

Viewers say they appreciate the show’s realistic depictions of the shifting social dynamics of Hong Kong and the growing impact of mainland China and its visitors on the city.

“I have a few bad experiences with mainlanders — most of them have to do with them jumping queues or being rude,” said Tai Wing-yi, a student at Hong Kong Baptist University. “But not all are like that. Some of my classmates are from the mainland, and they are nice to be around, and they work hard. In fact, they are the ones who contribute more than the locals in group projects.

“The show highlighted the tension between mainland Chinese and locals in a funny way, and got the message across in a lighthearted manner,” she said.

Chen Min, a mainland journalist who has visited Hong Kong many times, said his social circle in the city included many more-educated and better-off local residents, who were usually polite, but that not all encounters were so smooth.

“Occasionally you run into problems that you didn’t encounter before,” he said. “Like a taxi driver who refuses to take you because you speak Mandarin, although you’re holding a map and address in Chinese.”

On another occasion, Mr. Chen said, he was lugging a heavy suitcase to a taxi. “The driver joked, ‘Carrying cash to buy an apartment?’ ”

The popularity of the show — there is already talk of a movie — suggests that it could pave the way for treatments with similar themes, much as, in the United States, “All in the Family” started a subgenre of politically tinged situation comedies during the turbulence of the Vietnam War.

In an opinion piece in Global Times, a populist mainland newspaper, Wendy Wang, a freelance writer from Shanghai, noted that mainlanders had long been derided on Hong Kong television, with men often portrayed as mobsters and women as flirty or worse.

But after the 1997 return of Hong Kong to Chinese rule, “mainlanders’ characters grew wealthier but not wiser,” she wrote.

Chris Buckley and Calvin Yang contributed reporting.

A version of this article appeared in print on February 11, 2013, on page B4 of the New York edition with the headline: Hong Kong TV Show Plays on Uneasy Ties With China.

Wow, talk about a major spinning job and to prey on the ignorant and unsuspected!

The NYT ariticle, if anyone cares to read it, actually say nothing that can be construed as recognition for the TVB series. It is all about the tense relationship between China and HK and the showing of the series was said to be reflect this development. It is more socio-political and not art/entertainment oriented as the writer is an ardent China follower.

hahaha that's awesome, it's like an advertisement for the series lol. Now there's definitely going to be people who are going to watch this series when they usually don't watch TVB series. Good for Wong Cho Lam, his series is being talked about overseas

hahaha that's awesome, it's like an advertisement for the series lol. Now there's definitely going to be people who are going to watch this series when they usually don't watch TVB series. Good for Wong Cho Lam, his series is being talked about overseas

Duh???

About 99.9% of the people who reads the NY Times do not watch TVB stuff and have no access to watch it anyway.

About 99.9% of the people who reads the NY Times do not watch TVB stuff and have no access to watch it anyway.

In my last post, I was mainly referring to Chinese people (who can read Ch. subs and/or understand Canto) since they're probably the only ones who'd even bother to tune in to the series because of what NY Times says. There are lots of Chinese who lost interest in TVB series/never really watched TVB series to begin with, but would tune in if a really interesting plot/issue to them, comes up (that's how I am with mainland Ch. series). And these people would have access to TVB series. Plenty of online sites where you can watch them for free, and some even with Eng subs for those Chinese who need them to help them understand the series.

In my last post, I was mainly referring to Chinese people (who can read Ch. subs and/or understand Canto) since they're probably the only ones who'd even bother to tune in to the series because of what NY Times says.

Ok, then how many of your specifically categorized Chinese reads the NY Times, which is an elitist newspaper? A few dozens?

Ok, then how many of your specifically categorized Chinese reads the NY Times, which is an elitist newspaper? A few dozens?

Not sure, but I do know that this article has been posted in a few Chinese/Asian forums already (such as this one), so it's bound to catch the attention of some Chinese who are really interested in the politics between HK and the mainland lol